What is Jin 勁? — Scott P. Phillips

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Re: What is Jin 勁? — Scott P. Phillips

Postby wayne hansen on Sat Jun 22, 2019 2:57 pm

marvin8 wrote:
Bao wrote:In the next similarly utterly confused episode, he says that something no one is teaching and no one knows about is unbroken, continuous movement which is in fact a secret and is not about using jin.
-argh- -argh- -argh-

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xNzMK_ZjMVk

I thought about publishing this comment on his Youtube video, but as I understand that he prefers to keep himself ignorant, I'll respect that and try not to educate him about rudimentary things every beginner in the traditional styles are taught.: "Sorry if I'll have to burst your bubble, but continuous unbroken movement is not a secret. Instead it's one of the most basic aspects of Tai Chi movement.

I'll attempt to paraphrase the two videos (to better understand Scott's viewpoint): Jin doesn’t work that well if you have to fight someone heavier than you and more aggressive. Get rid of jin and force against force. Instead cultivate emptiness, counterbalance, floating root (e.g., George Xu, Richard Clear), etc.



Scott said "continuous connection," not continuous movement. Don’t use jin use continuous connection. How do you get continuous connection? You get it using four words Xukong Lingtong. We are only going to talk about xu right now, "hollow body” (aka empty body). Xu: empty like a puppet, "dead weight" body, but it is also radiant and luminous. “Hollow body” exercise cultivates maximum gravity, etc.

Hollow body (e.g., NoSword in RSF discussion) is an concept/exercise used by acrobats, gymnasts and aerial artists. Here a Ciruqe du Soleil acrobat does a hollow body exercise. (At 3:30, the acrobat says a celebrity surgeon said you'll never have back problems [e.g., johnwang's hunchback thread], if you do the exercise well):


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b1K0BdjnNks&t=3m30s

Excerpt from "Details of the Pure Internal Neigong Workshop this Friday:"

Scott Park Phillips on March 19, 2018 wrote:The first big change was the ability to create the illusion that I was moving one way, when I was actually moving in a different way. In simple terms, people automatically try to read my intent, but if my intent is habitually not in my own body, people usually mis-read it. This creates an illusion of power. I categorize this practice as emptiness, because it is the result of practicing moving/fighting/dancing exclusively with intent outside my body.

The second big change was the ability to counter-balance all incoming forces. This is what the Classics mean when they say "never go force against force." It creates the counter-intuitive illusion of unstoppable force. Once I understood this, my mind exploded because I realized that the Waltz was a more direct way to learn these skills (and that became another workshop I teach). This revelation forced me to start over from the beginning and re-learn all the martial arts I have learned over the last 40 years.

Those two big changes then revealed something completely un-expected, which is the subject of this workshop. In simple terms, following these new rules-of-movement changed my physical body. It forced me to reverse all the power organization in my body. In the last few years I have turned my body inside out! I started developing protocols of strength training by combining Daoyin with Circus training and then testing and refining them with my martial arts students. There are basically two types of active resistance tests, fast and slow. Slow tests are tests for the continuity of illusion. Fast tests are tests of whole-body unity. This fantastic feed-back loop led to a complete reconceptualization of how my body is organized. The beauty of it is that it makes everything simpler.

I began to see the basic training of Chinese Opera-Circus basics with new eyes. Much of the New Circus movement came out of the technology of Chinese Opera (via Lu Yi at the San Francisco Circus Center, among others) which was originally saturated with Daoist meditation techniques including the Golden Elixir. In the early Twentieth Century these types of techniques were considered "banned religion" and went underground. (They were nearly lost during a century of mass murder).

The material I am teaching Friday is how to develop a reverse-power body. This class is dedicated to strength training and conditioning. You will sweat and burn. This approach can heal a lot of old injuries and make you better looking. I will also attempt to transmit an understanding of how all the pieces of internal martial arts fit together, and overview of the process that allowed me to created this self-testing feed-back-loop--so you can develop one too.


Thanks for that video it reminds me of a lot of stuff we did in the early 70's at Tang Shou Dao and some of the stuff I still do on the ball and roller
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Re: What is Jin 勁? — Scott P. Phillips

Postby Bao on Sat Jun 22, 2019 3:12 pm

marvin8 wrote: Jin doesn’t work that well if you have to fight someone heavier than you and more aggressive.


Jin works perfectly fine. It doesn't work when you mistake jin as something similar to force as you do now. Mr Phillips has no idea about the concept of jin.

Get rid of jin and force against force. Instead cultivate emptiness,


This statement is utterly confused. Emptiness and Jin are not mutually exclusive. Emptiness is something that makes a lot of Jin in Tai chi work.

Scott said "continuous connection," not continuous movement.


Movement without connection is not good Tai chi movement. The default state is connection. Continuous connection and continuous movement are the same.ll

Don’t use jin use continuous connection.


How can you have continuous connection without Jin? It doesn't make sense ffs.

How do you get continuous connection? You get it using four words Xukong Lingtong.


1. What he writes about on that page could just as much describe Jin.
2. Emptiness is not a condition for continuous connection. But six correlations (liuhe) coordinated movement is, which something I can't even spot an inch of in his own movements.
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Re: What is Jin 勁? — Scott P. Phillips

Postby richardman on Mon Jun 24, 2019 7:28 pm

Did he seriously just talk about Jin sitting on a couch for almost 14 minutes?
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Re: What is Jin 勁? — Scott P. Phillips

Postby origami_itto on Wed Jun 26, 2019 6:17 am

So, on Facebook, told somebody they looked like a muppet when they hit the heavy bag, and he chimed in with this.

Most Chinese martial arts are based on the movement of puppets, especially Tai Chi. That is why it is so important to re-enchant the martial arts and to know the origins of them in culture. Puppets were the most powerful exorcists in Daoist Religion. The theater-martial aesthetic developed from the Tang Dynasty (600-900CE) obsession with puppets. Before the Boxer Uprising, if you said to someone, "you move like a puppet" that was the HIGHEST complement. That's why I put the puppet version of Nezha, China's greatest ever human fighter on the cover. https://amzn.to/2J82TeB
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Re: What is Jin 勁? — Scott P. Phillips

Postby Trick on Wed Jun 26, 2019 6:51 am

It’s the puppet show
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Re: What is Jin 勁? — Scott P. Phillips

Postby Giles on Wed Jun 26, 2019 6:56 am

@Origami
He's most certainly putting the cart before the horse, but there is an interesting connection, kind of. If you don't know this (very) short story by Kleist,take a look:
https://southerncrossreview.org/9/kleist.htm

This story was 'rediscovered' by the Tai Chi community in Hamburg in the 1980s.
So the quoted compliment would indeed have a logic, even if its historicity may be dubious.
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Re: What is Jin 勁? — Scott P. Phillips

Postby origami_itto on Wed Jun 26, 2019 6:59 am

The cart before the horse is my whole problem with this guy.

His basic thesis:

Taijiquan is attributed to Chang San Feng.
Chan San Feng is a character in some theater plays.
THEREFORE
Taijiquan is a theater art.

Everything that follows is interpreted through that lens and is tainted.
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Re: What is Jin 勁? — Scott P. Phillips

Postby GrahamB on Sun Jul 14, 2019 12:50 am

He's the 'Marmite' of the Tai Chi world (well, one of the Marmites anyway, you could argue the Tai Chi world is made up of Marmite personalities all the way down), but this article is a nice neat summation of Scott Phillips's theory of Taijiquan as dramatic storytelling.

Easy to dismiss as "he's just a dancer", but to me those Chen style movements look so stylistic that they're clearly not *just* martial movements. China has also clearly gone through *several* major political and cultural shifts that changed their world - the alternative theory that somebody hundreds of years ago created a martial art and that's exactly what we're practicing today (unchanged) just doesn't cut it for me.

Anyway, I think it's worth a read if you have an interest in his theory:
"The Zhang Sanfeng Conundrum Taijiquan and Ritual Theater"--
The Journal of Daoist Studies at Academia.edu available for FREE DOWNLOAD. ENJOY.

https://www.academia.edu/39776753/The_Zhang_Sanfeng_Conundrum_Taijiquan_and_Ritual_Theater?fbclid=IwAR0Sk67d4JUYCI5JCYiXP2vJXc2qGsvpUA6TQDB2jR5V20PTZwod8-6vU1Y

You can still buy the paper version from Three Pines Press." Article is on page 98.
Last edited by GrahamB on Sun Jul 14, 2019 1:06 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: What is Jin 勁? — Scott P. Phillips

Postby Trick on Sun Jul 14, 2019 2:43 am

Damn I’ve tried to find Marmite here in China, anyone know where to get it, Chen village ? .......But seriously can one find that spread here.
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Re: What is Jin 勁? — Scott P. Phillips

Postby wayne hansen on Sun Jul 14, 2019 10:58 am

Marmite is the Jake mace of spreads
Try vegemite for the real thing
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Re: What is Jin 勁? — Scott P. Phillips

Postby Trick on Mon Jul 15, 2019 1:05 am

Ah, Vegemite is the Australian Marmite, that one might be around here in China, will look around for that one...........So Marmite is Mace and C.P.Phillips, any (Taiji)celebs down under that spread Vege ? I’ll bet Montaigue used to 8-)
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Re: What is Jin 勁? — Scott P. Phillips

Postby wayne hansen on Mon Jul 15, 2019 1:54 am

No he was a marmite man from England
Don't put power into the form let it naturally arise from the form
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Re: What is Jin 勁? — Scott P. Phillips

Postby Trick on Mon Jul 15, 2019 2:35 am

8-)
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Re: What is Jin 勁? — Scott P. Phillips

Postby marvin8 on Mon Jul 15, 2019 8:56 am

Scott Park Phillips wrote:Most Chinese martial arts are based on the movement of puppets, especially Tai Chi. That is why it is so important to re-enchant the martial arts and to know the origins of them in culture. Puppets were the most powerful exorcists in Daoist Religion. The theater-martial aesthetic developed from the Tang Dynasty (600-900CE) obsession with puppets. Before the Boxer Uprising, if you said to someone, "you move like a puppet" that was the HIGHEST complement. That's why I put the puppet version of Nezha, China's greatest ever human fighter on the cover. https://amzn.to/2J82TeB

Giles wrote:@Origami
He's most certainly putting the cart before the horse, but there is an interesting connection, kind of. If you don't know this (very) short story by Kleist,take a look:
https://southerncrossreview.org/9/kleist.htm

This story was 'rediscovered' by the Tai Chi community in Hamburg in the 1980s.
So the quoted compliment would indeed have a logic, even if its historicity may be dubious.

Excerpt from "Taichi: A Personal Learning Experience:"
Arthur T. Orawski on 2016 wrote: (Material in book is based on over 20 years of study at Master Waysun Liao's school.)

Image

Question: ls there a pull there? Pulling it in?

There is an invisible string (behind your back) pulling your opponent's hands in {K).
Invisible strings use an invisible string to pull in: (it follows) an invisible route. That is how you can deal with your opponent, how you cause him trouble. Make contact; there are strings back there; make contact, and think about the strings back there. Ah, he is going... Contact, pull the string, and then he goes - that's good (W. Contact, pull the string to that side <---, and he goes <---. You must do this. That is why we want to do Ward Off (M), back and forth. Upward and Downward: pull the string - cut it off; hold on - cut it off.

You see, you work with a lot of strings. Refer to the Tai chi Classics: read, read, read, read; chi flow must be like pulling silk out of a cocoon (refer to Quote III-26). You read it 100’s of times - how about 10,000 times? Upward and Downward: pull up, and cut the string... pull down, and cut the string... You pull the silk out of a cocoon. Here (N): you pull silk: you come in; you pull the silk; Tai chi... You do that. So, first, don't push; you are pulling silk out of him now, ahh... If you push at it - see that? - you are in big trouble; pull silk out of him (0).

Image

You don't see Master pulling back; it is called invisible. Refinement of power must be like refining steel: <e.g., like pounding one hand with another repeatedly> many times, many times; you are knitting many times (P). You are knitting the bag, many times, many times... Ward Off ... back and forth... Many times; don't worry about it. Be weak, weak, weak... Weak: the body is weak, and thus chi can be strong. If the body is strong, then chi is weak. So you want to reverse; reverse. In a movie theater, you turn off the lights, and then you see nothing <around you>; but you see the screen very clearly. Be very weak, very weak; so you better lose the cocoon. You better be like a puppet. You want to move backwards; so you better move backwards yourself - No. You pull on the string... that's what you want. One day, two days, three days ... eventually, you can play that puppet. The trick, the most interesting part, is that you play (at moving like a puppet). You have an invisible string... Then, when you come in contact with your opponent, you do that to him. And he cannot prevent it. That's because you have a secret puppet in your pocket. He sees your hand (but not the string>. In a puppet show: you try to hide the string; you don't show that string; the puppet looks as if it were real.

Image

The same idea applies here: you hide your string. So you have a string, and another string - you pull here, here... (Q)... sometimes you pull like this... the hand goes up, the shoulder goes up, etc. Later on, you can pull your opponent's string. He has a string, but he doesn't realize it. He doesn't need a string, since, most of the time, his string is very weakened. Do you understand? When you do this, you look. as if you were being very sloppy - watch. Why is Master so sloppy? Because he is relaxed; he can depend on his own string - let chi be the string. It's no problem for Master. Now he is going to pull a student's string: he has him bring his hand up: “1 am going to pull your string; now you bring it up; bring your hand up, very hard” - now the student is in big trouble. Why? Because Master “pulled him”; he “pulled” him. “Pull your hand back - you are in trouble because I do as follows: I cut the string off” (the student staggers). The student is very awkward now. It is just as it would be in a puppet show: if Master cuts your string - if a couple of strings are missing - you become very awkward. You have to treat your string like this, this ... (e.g., while in Preparation, it pulls forward, or the hand goes back, up, etc.). That's OK - that's done all with strings, as in a puppet show. Then, over here, you do this (e.g., move physically) - no; you do that - no; your invisible string is complete, inside. Holding... up... open...

So you have to practice; don't just understand it, and not practice: then Master still has the string, and you do not have a string. You have to practice so much that you grow a string - grow a strong string. You grow it just as if you were growing fruit: then you will have a string.

We now have one more reason with which to answer the question: why don't you move quickly in Tai chi; why do you move slowly? It's because you have strings all over. You cannot even scratch your head <without using a large number of them>: look at how Master scratches his
head: <his hand goes up, each finger goes up individually, his elbow goes up, his hand goes up and swings over, and down onto, the head; his arm is pulled back, pulled forward, pulled back, pulled forward - scratching> (R). Does it feel awkward? - it feels very awkward here; but he does it anyway... too bad <so what if it feels or looks awkward>. Later on, you are <you look> awkward: aha - you will be free, your opponent will be awkward, since you 面11 pull your opponent's wrong string. You are going to confuse him.

Image

That is why they say you must be free - dynamic; forward or backward, you are dynamic - free (refer to Quotes lll-16 & 17). Consider your opponent: he wants to move, as if he were very smart; but, all of a sudden, you cut his string... Despite being an able, very strong, man, all of a sudden he is awkward. Why? Because his string is broken. That's why you go through this work. Where is the main string (S)? Aha! Be like a puppet.

From the very first day Master has been saying that Tai chi says to be like a puppet.
However, (suspending from the crown point) is just one string. One string won't produce a puppet show; with one string <a puppet can only move up and down, or in some other limited fashion>.
You now need one more string ... and another ... and one more... You need one more (e.g., an arm goes up), one more (e.g., the other arm goes up), one more (your side goes forward), one more (the other side goes forward)... See, this one string, going up and down, cannot go forward and backward; so you need one more here. So, eventually, that is why

Image

we are so awkward, from here, pull this side, pull that side, go to the center, hang here... (T). If you don't hang this (e.g., any part of your body), you will be shut down. And you will go up and down: up... arm... each of the five fingers... Cheng Man-Ching said that in his book - except that nobody read it very carefully. He said that, in order to move (e.g., the arm) up, you must go from here - the shoulder, the elbow, the forearm, etc. Slowly, bring that up: nobody paid attention. That is why we tell you to make a circle - a circle means many. When Master says the hand moves like a circle, it is not as in (U:a) – no; it means many, many become a circle (U:b) (not a square). Move section by section; many fine points become a circle. So, later on, you don't move your hand - <the string moves it> up... you do it without touching your opponent ahh, down... right side, left side, backward, forward... After you put all of this together, you pull your opponent's string - and you give him one cut: you want him to fall down CV). You pull him to one side. He is not a puppet; he is only puppet-like. What does puppet-like mean? You pull him to one side (V:a), and as a result, he leans to the other side (V:b) (he resists). You want him to fall down in this direction (V:b) - go <you cut the string, and he falls towards (V:b)>… A real puppet <would behave differently>: if you do it to a real puppet, does this happen? - no <if you cut one string, the puppet just hangs on via the other strings>. Human beings <are different from inanimate objects>: Cheng Man-Ching said that a stone horse has no value; however, a real horse comes to you if you touch his nose. So, think like a puppet. A human being is a fake puppet: “You do this (W:a)? What do I do (W:b)? I only fall back (W:d) <when you cut the string (W:c)…” Do it; do it. Ward Off works in a similar manner (X); there is a string: you are hanging from it (swinging back and forth), go...

Image

Question: So, one string moves from one small section of the body to the next?

It is very small, very small, very fine ... Basically, you want to hang from one string to begin with. Eventually, there are small strings all over the place (each part of the body); they are all over there. Don't worry about this too much for now. Just follow this kind of Preparation. With Preparation you can virtually do anything you want.
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Re: What is Jin 勁? — Scott P. Phillips

Postby Bhassler on Mon Jul 15, 2019 10:52 am

The movements are only stylized if you don't know what you're doing. If you actually know the applications and what's being trained, it's a fairly literal correlation between the movements in the form and their application. I love the arrogance of it all-- it's not me that's missing something it's the entire rest of the world.
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